Company working to bring clean wind energy to Missouri

ST. JOSEPH, Mo. (KQTV/CNN) - A company is working to bring clean wind energy to the Midwest.

Plans to bring a 700 mile high energy power line powered by wind energy could become a reality in Kansas and Missouri in the next five years.

Clean Line Energy's project would bring a power line that would run 35 mega watts of electricity through this area.

"Three Hoover Dams worth of power can fit on this. Obviously it's a lot of energy. It would come through this general vicinity and a transmission line. We're studying a drop off delivery in Missouri and continuing on across the Indiana-Illinois border," said Mark Lawler with Clean Line Energy.

The Grain Belt Express Line is one of four lines planned by the company. The project is slated to cost nearly $2 billion. It's ambitious, but Clean Line Energy believes it is the wave of the future for areas ready to accept it.

"When you scale it up, and you're talking about 3,500 mega watts of wind, it brings the overall cost of the delivered power down. In the end, you're delivering a very cheap, clean source of energy to states that don't have that much access to it," said Lawler.

He says the project is still in the early stages. They're still working out where the route will go through Kansas and Missouri.

Lawler says the company is looking for local contractors to work on the construction phase in the coming years.

"It's our belief that if you're going to bring a large-scale infrastructure project in the state, you find a way to sink the benefits as locally as possible," he said.

Clean Line Energy claims the project will bring more than 5,000 new jobs in its stretch, and bring millions in property tax revenue.

This still doesn't guarantee you'll have their power in your home.

"The laws of the state wouldn't allow us to compete directly in that regard. So our goal is to deliver it to a place in what's called a merchant market," said Lawler.

Meaning that the electricity will be there and it's up to utility companies to buy it.

The company hopes the Grain Belt Express Line will be fully operational by 2018.